In 2009, the corrupt democrat-centric “PolitiFact” called Sarah Palin’s proclamation that ObamaCare had “death panels” essentially unelected, unaccountable, bureaucrats who could grant or deny treatment to patients, based on age, or even how much they “contribute” to society, the “Lie of the Year“. As we have learned since, the only lie, and liars, are those who have called Governor Palin a liar, and those who continue to lie about the absence of death panels in ObamaCare.

These death panels, known as the Independent Payment Advisory Board [IPAB] are what everyone was talking about.

On Friday, August 7, 2009 Governor Sarah Palin wrote: [emphasis mine]

Statement on the Current Health Care Debate

As more Americans delve into the disturbing details of the nationalized health care plan that the current administration is rushing through Congress, our collective jaw is dropping, and we’re saying not just no, but hell no!

The Democrats promise that a government health care system will reduce the cost of health care, but as the economist Thomas Sowell has pointed out, government health care will not reduce the cost; it will simply refuse to pay the cost. And who will suffer the most when they ration care? The sick, the elderly, and the disabled, of course. The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama’s “death panel” so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their “level of productivity in society,” whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil.

Health care by definition involves life and death decisions. Human rights and human dignity must be at the center of any health care discussion.

Rep. Michele Bachmann highlighted the Orwellian thinking of the president’s health care advisor, Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, the brother of the White House chief of staff, in a floor speech to the House of Representatives. I commend her for being a voice for the most precious members of our society, our children and our seniors.

We must step up and engage in this most crucial debate. Nationalizing our health care system is a point of no return for government interference in the lives of its citizens. If we go down this path, there will be no turning back.

Ronald Reagan once wrote, “Government programs, once launched, never disappear. Actually, a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we’ll ever see on this earth.” Let’s stop and think and make our voices heard before it’s too late.
~ Sarah Palin

Rep. Bachmann’s speech can be viewed here:

Since Governor Palin’s ground-shaking Facebook post, some of Obama’s closest advisers have admitted that death panels do, indeed, exist.

Last September Steven Rattner, President’s former [and failed] Car Czar wrote an op-ed in the New York Times that not only admitted death panels were a part of Obama’s treacherous legislation, but the rationing of health care was essential: [emphasis mine]

Beyond Obamacare

WE need death panels.

Well, maybe not death panels, exactly, but unless we start allocating health care resources more prudently — rationing, by its proper name — the exploding cost of Medicare will swamp the federal budget.

But in the pantheon of toxic issues — the famous “third rails” of American politics — none stands taller than overtly acknowledging that elderly Americans are not entitled to every conceivable medical procedure or pharmaceutical.

Most notably, President Obama’s estimable Affordable Care Act regrettably includes severe restrictions on any reduction in Medicare services or increase in fees to beneficiaries. In 2009, Sarah Palin’s rant about death panels even forced elimination from the bill of a provision to offer end-of-life consultations.

At the time I wrote:

In her 2009 article Sarah Palin mentions Dr Ezekiel Emanuel, Rahm Emanuel’s brother and Obama’s adviser on ObamaCare. Dr Emanuel is the creator of the so-called “Complete Lives System” a document that would make Dr Josef Mengele proud. I suggest everyone read Emanuel’s report entitled: Principles for allocation of scarce medical interventions to understand how these people’s thinking works.

While admitting death panels exist, Rattner still felt compelled to lie about Medicare as well as take a gratuitous shot at Governor Palin. Fact is, ObamaCare is hateful, as hateful as the democrats who created it. All one has to do is read Dr Emanuel’s little essay to understand evil in our time.

In a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed, Governor Howard Dean, a one time presidential candidate, and a doctor, while shilling for ObamaCare in general, took a big swipe at the death panels included in this evil law, even going so far as saying this panels should be abolished! [emphasis mine]

One major problem is the so-called Independent Payment Advisory Board.

The IPAB is essentially a health-care rationing body. By setting doctor reimbursement rates for Medicare and determining which procedures and drugs will be covered and at what price, the IPAB will be able to stop certain treatments its members do not favor by simply setting rates to levels where no doctor or hospital will perform them.

There does have to be control of costs in our health-care system. However, rate setting—the essential mechanism of the IPAB—has a 40-year track record of failure. What ends up happening in these schemes (which many states including my home state of Vermont have implemented with virtually no long-term effect on costs) is that patients and physicians get aggravated because bureaucrats in either the private or public sector are making medical decisions without knowing the patients. Most important, once again, these kinds of schemes do not control costs. The medical system simply becomes more bureaucratic.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has indicated that the IPAB, in its current form, won’t save a single dime before 2021. As everyone in Washington knows, but less frequently admits, CBO projections of any kind—past five years or so—are really just speculation. I believe the IPAB will never control costs based on the long record of previous attempts in many of the states, including my own state of Vermont.

If Medicare is to have a secure future, we have to move away from fee-for-service medicine, which is all about incentives to spend more, and has no incentives in the system to keep patients healthy. The IPAB has no possibility of helping to solve this major problem and will almost certainly make the system more bureaucratic and therefore drive up administrative costs.

To date, 22 Democrats have joined Republicans in the House and Senate in support of legislation to do away with the IPAB. Yet because of the extraordinary partisanship on Capitol Hill and Republican threats to defund the law through the appropriations process, it is unlikely that any change in the Affordable Care Act will take place soon.

The IPAB will cause frustration to providers and patients alike, and it will fail to control costs. When, and if, the atmosphere on Capitol Hill improves and leadership becomes interested again in addressing real problems instead of posturing, getting rid of the IPAB is something Democrats and Republicans ought to agree on.

Governor Dean is right. Anytime government attempt to impose price controls on goods and services the results are disastrous. We saw this during the Nixon administration, the liberal president’s answer to run away inflation, that led to the incredible rise in the price of gasoline, and other commodities, and eventually shortages.

Here’s a thought provoking essay from Jack Rafuse from 2007 that speaks to the horrors of government imposed price and wage controls.

On Tuesday night, Governor Palin talked at length with Sean Hannity about ObamaCare and the looming disaster all American’s face: